Buying airline tickets

There is no best time. The worst time is likely to be just a few weeks before you're due to travel. Fares in some markets go up and down a lot. Over and over again. It's totally unpredictable.

My technique is to decide what airports I will fly into and out of, look at flight options to decide which few are most attractive to me, and check fares on those flights very, very frequently--ideally every day. I keep a record of what I see. In that way I develop a feeling for what is the normal price range, and I'm ready to react if there's a fare drop. In the past I've seen some good buying opportunities in the fall, but unless you get lucky and bump into something really incredible when you first start looking, it's hard to know what is a pretty good deal until you've done some research.

You do not necessarily have to fly in and out of the same city. Explore "multi-city" fares if your itinerary looks more like a line than a circle. Sometimes the multi-city fare doesn't cost extra; sometimes it does.

If you'll tell us your home airport and your itinerary, someone on the forum may have specific information that will help you. It would also be useful to know your specific travel dates if you have pinned them down.

Unfortunately you didn't say where're your flying from and where you want to fly to in Italy.
Your trip will be in the highest season for prices. If you could back up into May, you'd probably save.
Direct non-stop flights into Italy from North America are relatively expensive (vs. some other countries), and there aren't really that many non-stop flights other than to Rome and maybe Milan.
You really need to watch online airfare websites for current prices now, trying to come up with a base range of normal airfares where you wish to go. And keep watching every few days for a month or two. If you see an airfare that's dramatically cheaper than the normal range, jump on it.

When is the best time to buy airline tickets?

There is no definitive answer to this question.
The 'thinkers' are still busy trying to calculate how many angels can fit on the head of a pin.

Go to Google Flights and figure out your preferred flights. If you are visiting say Rome and Venice, try to do an "open jaw" (multi-city) ticket where you flight into one city out of the other. (Into Venice out of Rome is probably best, to avoid an early flight out of Venice). This would be one ticket, not two one-way tickets. This would save you a day of traveling back to your origin city just to fly out. If you absolutely can't get good or competitive flights that way and have to round trip say to Rome, you can still take the train to Venice to start. (I have no idea where in Italy you will go, assume Venice but not sure.)

Then, in Google Flights, set fare alerts for your preferred flights. You'll get an email when fares drop. Personally, I wouldn't buy tickets this early for next June unless I got an amazing fare.

Try to buy directly from the airlines, not through a third party like Orbitz, unless you are saving a ton of money. Fewer hassles that way. Google Flights will direct you to several other sites including the airline sites directly.

As stated above, there is no simple answer to your question. Flight prices go up and down all the time. Generally, they only go up once the actual flight date approaches, but there's no rhyme or reason (at least none that's understandable by a human) to pricing.

There are no shortcuts. The best practice is to figure out what you want, and what's acceptable, monitor prices over the weeks to see the range within which they typically fluctuate. Buy when it looks good, and then don't look back.

The more flexible you can be the better, but beware that simply chasing the absolute cheapest possible price which can often result in an utterly miserable experience (educate yourself about "basic economy" fares).

The best time is when the price is well below average. You have to educate yourself to know what that average price is, and then you have to check daily.

We are going to Italy in July next year (the only time we have available). We just bought airfare last week. Seattle to Toronto to Milan and then Milan to Frankfurt to Seattle. Purchased directly from the airline. Both trips under 14.5 hours. $960. This is not bad for the west coast. I would definitely start looking now. In my past experience flights only go up in price after December.

I would do what the others say, set an alert on your preferred search website (I had a kayak alert for ANY dates from ATL to FCO emailed to me every day for a year and a half) and keep an eye out. The less picky you are about dates, layovers, and airlines the easier it will be to get a low fare. I’m taking a layover in Philly (I can go explore the city) on the way there and one in Heathrow on the way back, but I got my flights next April/May for $548.....I had seen some prices and dates start getting closer to how much I wanted to pay and when I wanted to go, so I started looking quite frequently. I bought my tickets in July, and now those flights are $1900....so yes, they jump around a lot.....just keep an eye out!

We chose June/July because the kids are out of school. It will be my son and his wife and 2 boys(13 and 10) and my husband and I. We will leave on June 23, 19 out of Kansas City, MO to Venice, then travel thoughtout Italy for a month and leave July 23, 19 from Florence to Kansas City. I already have places to stay. Thank you all for you help. Also, any particular airlines better than the other? I found United to be the least expensive so far.

Tina

Honestly, I look at the schedule, the price and where I have to connect. I've ended up on United and Delta and their partners recently, but I have nothing against American.

I have a rather strong preference for changing planes in Europe rather than the US on the outbound trip. If something goes wrong and I miss my connection, I'd rather be somewhere with more flights headed to my destination the same day. If you are connecting in the US and something goes wrong, you might be stuck in North America for 24 more hours. However, folks starting out in the Midwest or West may not have the same options I do.

The other thing I do is stay away from the minimum connection times allowed by the airlines. I assume most people with those short layovers do make their flights, but I would be nervous with just 55 minutes, 1 hr. 10 min., etc. Who needs that stress? I try for at least 2 hours to connect, and I avoid London-Heathrow and Paris-Charles de Gaulle. Again, being on the East Coast is an advantage, in that I often have a lot of connection possibilities.

"The other thing I do is stay away from the minimum connection times allowed by the airlines"

Yes! This ^ ^ ^!!

If you have a connection in Europe to your last leg in to Venice, make sure you give yourselves enough time to clear Immigration in your arrival city. I usually want 3 hours for this altho I can get by with a little less in Amsterdam.

Coming home you'll go thru Immigration wherever you land first in the US. DO give yourselves 3 hours for this one. You'd think it might be easier to come thru the border coming back home but sometimes that's not the way it is. There is a app called mobile passport which might work for you altho it seems to work better for 1 person/1 phone instead of several people listed on the same app. My experience is based on only ONE entry thru JFK, so may not be typical, just throwing it out there.

I do prefer changing in Amsterdam going or coming if I have to change in Europe. This airport is pretty easy to get around and was particularly so when I was a newbie traveler to Europe.

I do see Delta apparently has a non-stop from Atlanta to Venice at least in the summer, so that might be a possibility for you.

Someone said (really have no idea where I read this) that Delta sometimes has sales over the Thanksgiving holiday so I'd start checking fares now, sign up for emails from the airlines that work for you and be ready to jump if you see a reduced rate.

@tjhelmer, everyone seems to have their favorite (and least-favorite) airlines. A lot depends on where you're flying from and to, as well as personal experiences. My husband doesn't like United because he says the flight attendants are a million years old. I like United just fine and since SFO is a United hub it makes it easy to go to Paris or Germany. But if there's a direct Lufthansa or Swiss or other United-affiliated flight for the same price, I'll get it for him. (Or one using United miles.) Going to Italy from SFO, however requires a stop so Delta/KLM/AirFrance via Amsterdam or Paris is a favorite. Some friends LOVE Norwegian;
others say "never again."
Since we're really flexible as to timing and destinations, the key is who is having an unmissable sale.

One strategy we use when purchasing airplane tickets: When we find a price we can live with we buy and THEN STOP LOOKING. Continuing to look for best prices after you buy will only make you crazy.

Buon viaggio,

Also, any particular airlines better than the other?

If you have your dates fixed, then pick the airline that best fits your schedule for the price you want. American. United. Delta. They're all good airlines.

Whatever airline you use, go ahead and sign up for their frequent flyer plan. Sign up for email and text updates. If there is a schedule change or a day of flight interruption in service, this may put you one step ahead of people who didn't bother to sign up for the airline's loyalty program.

Download the Mobile Passport app. Make sure you set up everything before you leave. It is a time saver when you come back into the US. Last June when we came back from Mexico to Dallas, the line was shorter than the global entry line.

First, Three Letters.... KLM. :) All this depends heavily on where you are departing from. If you are in a major hub city, New York, LA, Seattle... etc, you can play the game of waiting to the last minute for the best price. However if you are departing from a small airport, we depart from Eugene, Or., you need to lock in the flight at least a month ahead of time. And as said earlier... never look back. Typically, the longer the layovers, 4 hr or more, and the more connections, will give you a lower cost. Airlines don't use the hub system any more and want you to hop from flight to flight. And also want you to take the earliest flight back to the US. These crazy, multi-connection flights work for us. We don't care about the layover times since we both have our laptops, and usually have some work to do. Layovers in Europe are fun, they have napping lounge chairs, not so fun in the US with layovers as American Airports are rather crude, don't have free lounge areas, compared to the European Airports. So some of this depends your tolerance to change flights or wait during a layover.

Francis, I'm not aware of a useful stand-by option for the typical traveler. To get on a flight as a standby passenger, I believe you have to already have a ticket for later that day, be recovering from having been bumped from an earlier flight, or be an airline employee/friend with a non-revenue ticket. Someone like me cannot just walk up to the ticket counter at the airport and buy a standby ticket to Europe.

If a flight is grossly undersold, the airline might cut the ticket price we see online in the period leading up to the departure date, but they tweak fares all the time. Most of us don't have the nerve to wait till the last minute in hopes of paying a less-than-astronomical fare.

Acraven, you are correct. I've edited my post. Stand-by now only applies to if you want to take an earlier flight then your pre-paid flight or you got or elected to be bumped. I just looked it up. I'm 60 years old, and remember the days when you could just show up at the airport and hope for a vacant seat. Flew many a time Seattle to Baltimore and back, for less than a Bus Ticket in the '70's, 80's and 90's. Seems that's not possible anymore. Oh, for the good old days! I may start another thread on the advantages of opting to be bumped for the atypical traveler, since I've flown to Hawaii twice, for free, using Comp Tickets. :)

Google Flights is your friend! As far out as it will let you, usually about 9 or 10 months, put in your desired dates, 2 or 3 closest airports for departure, your destination city or cities desired and then track the prices.

If you use your regular gmail account you will get updates as prices change. I just booked 5 tickets from Cincinnati to Rome and then back to Cincinnati from Vencie for $746 each for June. 1 layover each way since I don't live near a major international airport. This was on American and British Airways.

I did see tickets as low as $550 each a couple of months ago, but I wasn't ready to book at the time. I could have tried to keep waiting for a better deal, but as June is a peak period, I didn't want to wait any longer. Price went from $1500 to $746 and back to $1500 over a 24 to 36 hour period of time.

You have to be ready to book when the right price presents itself.

Crgraham, I would absolutely have bought at that price if I lived in Cincinnati. It was a great deal, and you knew to grab it because you had been watching fares.

Delta HAS previously had sales around Thanksgiving on fares to Europe.
One caveat: Watch prices daily beginning well before Thanksgiving.

A couple years back, the "Black Friday Fare" sale was sold out before Thursday rolled around, let alone on Black Friday itself.
REALLY good prices, but limited seats (not terribly so, but obviously not enough to last the week, either)

I like to start planning with Google Flights or Skyscanner- you can plug in different dates to get a idea of pricing from many different airlines. Then you can go directly to your airline of choice, or use a site like Orbitz or Expedia for a package. I book at least 6 months or more prior to my trip- the earlier you look the better rate you will get- 6-12 months prior to departure.
For train ticket research:

https://loco2.com/en?

https://www.rome2rio.com/

Happy Travels💫✨

I would not use Rome2Rio to research train fares, durations or schedules. It's an unnecessary extra step if you are specifically interested in trains (as opposed to figuring out what mode of transportation you need between two small towns, for which Rome2Rio is very handy). For trains, the [Deutsche Bahn][1] website is extremely user-friendly if you're just looking for schedules. It won't have fares for non-German trains.

For fares, I like to use the website of the country's rail company. [Seat61.com][2] will identify those for you, but careful Googling will also turn them up. Avoid RailEurope, which doesn't offer all the trains and has significant service fees.